Cooze (Something Smells Fishy Over At ABC News,...)

So, Rielle Hunter was all dolled-up on 20/20, as though she "thought" new hair and make-up could somehow make her disgusting, nonsensical NewAge ideas more palatable. Hey, it worked for Oprah, right? Which is the part of all this I find funny:

 20/20 is on ABC. 

ABC was Oprah's network. 

Yet Oprah's "spiritual" ideas and Rielle Hunter's are the same.

How people keep missing that is a billion dollar question. I guess the answer is the same way they keep missing who really brought down John Edwards. 

I say - starting with Oprah's (repeatedly) getting off the hook - let's hear it on the NewAge double-double-cross, for the win,…
 

Your Day Will Come (Starting On The 1st Of Nevruary,...)

So, looking at the news, if anyone else wants to try and suggest I'm wrong in seeing what I see out there, I say they're welcome to come hang around awhile and it'll be they who will be proven wrong:

Somewhere in the recent past (say, about the time "Dreams From My Father" was published), liberals decided reality wasn't really their thing."

No, what's been happening may not be immediately apparent to the multitudes of less observant types, but eventually, everybody's going to catch up with the Crackster - it just takes 'em a while:

In ‘The Amateur’ Mr Klein claims that relations between Miss Winfrey and Mrs Obama took a nosedive over the chat show host’s close relationship with Mr Obama.

The book claims that in the weeks after the 2008 U.S. election victory Mr Obama gave Miss Winfrey’s advice ‘priority over Michelle’s’

Mr Klein writes: ‘When she (Winfrey) phoned, he dropped everything and took her call. They huddled over strategy. Of all of Obama’s unofficial White House advisers, Oprah had unparalleled access, input, influence, and power.’

Mr Klein quotes a White House insider who says that Mrs Obama was ‘furious’ about her husband’s late night phone calls to Miss Winfrey and that he should be turning to her for advice instead.

What can bother me is how they also miss the connections - the all-important connections - so I usually have to go through a few years of Hell, of being denounced, of being called obsessed, merely because I see patterns around us that are pretty obvious if more people would bother to really look:

The centre began to crumble as the sexual revolution, globalization and increased wealth led to the decline of the mainstream churches. In its place emerged a nation that turned to the extremes: from Glenn Beck to Oprah Winfrey. Yes, that Oprah. The queen of self-actualization, says Mr. Douthat, preaches a brand of spirituality that is self-centred, destructive and parasitic.

Mind you - I get it - it's hard to see the machinations of the "spirit" world. It's like trying to catch smoke in a jar because, let's face it, "occult" means "hidden" and these occultists don't want you to see any more than they allow. But when someone is as focussed as I am, I can't help but wonder why anyone doubts me. I'm on our side, and how NewAge works is going to come out anyway:

[Rielle] Hunter went on the run with [John Edwards' aide, Andrew Young] and his wife. Edwards' campaign finance chairman let them stay at his vacation mansion in Aspen, Colo., and paid for them to live in a $20,000-a-month manor in Santa Barbara, Calif. Hunter chose the location because it was close to her New Age spiritual adviser, Bob McGovern.

Hunter so relied on McGovern that when an Aspen restaurant served her a Reuben sandwich with the wrong sauce on it, she made an angry call to him to ask him to fix it, according to testimony at Edwards' trial.

It's like society is infested with gremlins, practicing the dark arts behind the scenes, disrupting lives and causing chaos, while flipping bad intentions (and behaviors) into "moral issues" on a whim:

Obama: Yeah, we’ve been fibbing about my position on same-sex marriage for a while now,…

The NewAge is driving us to avoiding the truth, and making us think attacking truth-tellers - and creating a nation of liars - is the height of "enlightenment," when it's (honestly) not working at all:

What HRC and other gay rights groups would like to sell the straight public is that gay couples are just like straight married couples. In many cases, they are. They are monogamous and have been together forever and raise their kids behind white picket fences. What they don't want you to know is that many gay couples, though married, civilly unionized, or otherwise commonlaw are inviting guys over for threeways, playing around with other guys on the side, or engaged in all other sorts of sexual hijinks. Yes, straight people have "swingers" but it seems like there is a stronger bent of "non-traditional arrangements" among the gays. It might be because gay men are horny bastards and because we didn't have your fiendish and chaste preset relationship constructs until recently when straight people decided it was time to stop treating us like second class citizens. Yeah, we may be married, but that doesn't mean we're dead or conforming to your rules.

Oh well. As always, I can wait:

'Gay marriage is not No.1 priority': Defence secretary Philip Hammond is latest to suggest coalition should shelve plans.

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
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I may not be the most successful blogger out there, but I know why, as others line up against me, time and again, to "do the right thing" without knowing where they got "the right thing" from. They call me a "bigot" because I claim I understand, and I do, but only because it's the same as it ever was:

As early as 1820, [Mormon leader, Joseph] Smith, at the age of about 19 years, began to assume the gift of supernatural endowments, and became the leader of a small party of shiftless men and boys like himself who engaged in nocturnal money-digging operations upon the hills in and about Palmyra.... Numbers of men and women, as was understood, were found credulous enough to believe "there might be something in it," who were induced by their confidence and cupidity to contribute privately towards the cost of carrying on the imposture, under the promise of sharing in the expected gains; and in this way the loaferly but cunning Smith, who was too lazy to work for his living, (his deluded followers did all the digging,) was enabled to obtain a scanty subsistence for himself without pursuing any useful employment. 
(Pomeroy Tucker Wayne Democratic Press, May 26, 1858)

So I leave you today with a warning, Ladies and Gents, as you line up on "the right side of history" (that's the area marked, "Suckers") and if you're smart, it's a warning you'll not soon forget:

Except for the cars - which were pretty ugly, and lousy, too - all gremlins are fictional creatures,…

But this one especially,...

Busted: John Edwards, Rielle Hunter, And Bob McGovern (NewAge Reveals All, Truth Seekers)

We predicted it, and - after a new piece by The National Enquirer's David Perel - we're pretty sure we were right:

John Edwards was exposed by Lisa Druck/Rielle Hunter's "astrologer" and confidant (who also "works with energy in the area of emotional fields") the "intuitive" Bob McGovern.

Here's Perel:

When John Edwards showed up at the Beverly Hilton hotel to meet with Rielle on the evening of July 21, 2008, a large team of reporters and photographers were on the grounds for the Enquirer, and he was photographed secretly as he confidently walked into a side door at 9:45 p.m.

The Enquirer knew what room Hunter was in, as well as the room where her male traveling companion was staying. When Edwards came down to the lobby at 2:40 am the Enquirer was waiting for him, famously chasing as he ran into a public bathroom.

Behind the scenes we exerted pressure on Edwards, sending word though mutual contacts that we had photographed him throughout the night. We provided a few details about his movements to prove this was no bluff.

For 18 days we played this game, and as the standoff continued the Enquirer published a photograph of Edwards with the baby inside a room at the Beverly Hilton hotel.

Journalists asked if we had a hidden camera in the room. We never said yes or no. (We still haven't). We sent word to Edwards privately that there were more photos.

He cracked.

First, the Enquirer "knew what room Hunter was in, as well as the room where her male traveling companion was staying." Who else would know that but "her male traveling companion" - who was Bob McGovern?

Second, Bob McGovern is an astrologer. Has anyone ever heard of an astrologer, mixed up in anything, who didn't immediately try to capitalize on their fame? Hunter's friend, Pigeon O'Brian, was on television as often as she could be, but good Ol' Bob was nowhere to be seen.

Third, McGovern is a NewAger. These people, because of their unstable belief system, have no solid morals to lean on. Consider this loopdy-loop:

Bob McGovern was deceiving/exploiting Lisa Druck/Rielle Hunter, who was deceiving/exploiting John Edwards, as they all were deceiving his wife, the cancer-stricken Elizabeth Edwards - and the press was deceiving everyone else.

Even Louise Hay, the so-called "Queen of NewAge" let it be known that Sylvia Browne - her best-selling author - was a fraud, but somehow, utilizing those values, we're supposed to believe Bob McGovern wouldn't sell out Lisa Druck/Rielle Hunter (AKA “Riddleydoo Spacepod Rainbow.”) for a payoff from the Enquirer? Puh-Leaze. As our friends at Death By 1000 Papercuts said at the time, "it’s likely that the Enquirer pays better than his regular day job in the mystic realm."

Forth, there was no one else who could've been in the room with Rielle Hunter and John Edwards, when the photo of Edwards and the baby was taken, but Bob McGovern.

And last but not least, since Bob McGovern was in the room when that photo was taken, Rielle Hunter had to know what was going on - either during Edwards' visit to see the baby or once the photo was publicized - making her an accomplice in a doublecross. Again:

Another NewAge liar engaged in betrayal - probably to end Edwards' marriage, so Hunter could live out her dream of becoming Mrs. John Edwards, or (since "Being" Isn't "Free") to get a settlement for child support.

So there you have it - Bob McGovern, the man who took out John Edwards, as both were sliding around on snake-oil.

And the destruction of everything NewAge touches continues,...

Rielle Hunter And Quotes From The NewAge

"I am going to be famous," Rielle said. "Rich and famous. I am going to meet a rich, powerful man." I was by now leaning against the kitchen cabinetry, and the fact that it was holding me up made me almost certain that Harrison Ford's virility had gone into its construction.

"Wow," I said. "How are you going to do that?" Rielle slid a toe out from under the tip of her flared yoga pants and poked me with it, playfully.

"I'm going to manifest it," she said.

I couldn't play along anymore.

"Good luck," I said. "I just ... I don't really believe in stuff like that." She backed away from me now, a conspiratorial smile on her face.

"You don't have to," she said. "I'm just going to keep using your amazing energy, and you'll see."

-- Sarah Miller, a contributor to the book, Bitch In The House, in The Gazette

"She is one of millions of other girls, not smart enough to make it as a writer, not pretty enough to model or act.

"She was average in every way, except for her drugs and whacked-out sense of truth."

-- A friend of Rielle Hunter's, painting an accurate picture of Hunter as the average NewAger, for New York's Daily News

"At this point, he doesn't want to comment, because he's thinking it's her affair. This is Rielle's problem."

-- Kelly McGovern, daughter of Hunter's friend, Bob McGovern (who set up the last Edwards trist) showing the loyalty NewAgers give to those they claim to love, in the New York Daily News

"As painful as it will be for him, he needs to come clean. There's an overwhelming view that he's still lying."

-- A former colleague of John Edwards, voicing the dominant feeling around the scandal, for New York's Daily News

"[Elizabeth Edwards] has no part to play at this year's Democratic National Convention. Edwards has not been buoyed by the sympathy one might expect for a woman scorned by a cheating husband."

-- WRAL.com

"I never figured you for a comforter, John. Sure, I heard your spill about the two Americas and your fight against poverty, but you were so bright and shiny that I could not make the words align with the speaker. You proved me wrong. You are a comforter. In your own way, albeit an affair, you lightened my days, reminded me of simpler times when I was less aware and much more naive. Thank you, John. For a second or two, I forgot to think like an informed adult."

-- Rebecca Powell, acknowledging her world being up-ended, for New West.

We Call Him Something Else

"That's what he calls himself. I don't have much to do with him."

-- Edmond Bigelow, 90, on his son-in-law, Nutjob Bob McGovern, the self-styled "healer" at the center of the John Edwards scandal, in the New York Daily News

Happiness Is A Warm Gun

It was Hunter presenting herself as an oddball burn-out that led some of us to assume that she invented or imagined the whole affair, and to thus downplay the story as bullshit from an acid casualty, and now there's egg on our faces as well. But at least we weren't the only ones to sleep on it.

-- Pareene, with a bullshit story of his/her own, that does at least nail down one way NewAgers work their particular magic: by not being thought of, either, as part of a movement or as potentially dangerous, for Gawker

[Slapping hands together] So where are we? Now that the MSM has jumped into the John Edwards/Lisa Druck AKA Rielle Hunter AKA The Enlightened One Scandal, do you think they've got the whole story? Sure, they've got the whole story.

No, my friends, they have nothing. As you can see, the beauty of NewAge is how like smoke it is, seeping into almost every crevice of society - it's a spiritual cult - so, as the newspapers attempt to give the impression they're opening a window and airing out the place, the stench is still clinging. What's been going on here, John?

"I would soon learn that there was no such thing as small talk with Rielle Hunter. She told me that she'd felt a connection to me when we'd first met, that she could tell I was a very old soul. This meant a lot to Rielle. Her speech was peppered with New Age jargon—human beings were dragged down by "blockages" to their actual potential; history was the story of souls entering and escaping our field of consciousness. A seminal book for her had been Eckhart Tolle's "The Power of Now." Her purpose on this Earth, she said, was to help raise awareness about all this, to help the unenlightened become better reflections of their true, repressed selves.

Her latest project was John Edwards. Edwards, she said, was an old soul who had barely tapped into any of his potential. The real John Edwards, she believed, was a brilliant, generous, giving man who was driven by competing impulses—to feed his ego and serve the world. If he could only tap into his heart more, and use his head less, he had the power to be a 'transformational leader' on par with Gandhi and Martin Luther King. 'He has the power to change the world,' she said."

-- Jonathan Darman, telling a credible tale, in Newsweek

The John was discussing Eckhart Tolle's The Power Of Now with Smiley Rielle "all the time." Nice. So let's dive into the ugly little man's ugly little "philosophy" and see what we find, shall we?

"Tolle’s non-fiction bestseller The Power of Now emphasizes the importance of being aware of the present moment as a way of not being caught up in thoughts of the past and future. His later book A New Earth further explores the structure of the human ego and how this acts to distract people from their present experience of the world. It is the feeding of the human ego that is thought to be the source of inner and outer conflict. Only in examining one’s ego may people begin to see beyond it and obtain a sense of spiritual enlightening or a new outlook on reality."

-- Wikipedia

Well alright. Very solipsistically sound. Very french.

And let's not forget Nutjob Bob McGovern, above, the man who probably set John Edwards up. (Or was it Margaret Sweet?)

In an interview Friday night on ABC's "Nightline," during which Edwards acknowledged that he once had a relationship with Hunter, he said McGovern was the one who reached out to him to arrange the July 21 meeting with her."

Nutjob Bob called The John. And The John trusted Nutjob Bob. What was Nutjob Bob's BS again?

Hunter herself has been deeply devoted to New Age spirituality and had run a website on the subject, an endeavor in which McGovern was believed to be involved.

During Friday's ABC interview, Edwards explained that he had been in Los Angeles on the day of the meeting with Hunter to participate in an event with Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa when he received an afternoon call in his hotel room from McGovern.

"I knew he was a friend of Ms. Hunter. And he asked me to come and meet with them. And I said, 'No,'" Edwards recalled. "I said, what's the purpose of the meeting? And the bottom line was that he said the purpose of the meeting was she was having some trouble, she just wanted to talk, wanted me to talk to him and to her about what their circumstances were."

Edwards said that he decided to visit with Hunter because he did not want her to go public about their affair, but that he told McGovern during their afternoon phone call that he would only show up if he was present at the meeting."

So The John trusts Nutjob Bob. Why does The John trust Nutjob Bob so much? If you're not a believer, would you even be seen with him? When you're the potential Vice President of the United States?

"Little is known about McGovern, 64, who lives with his wife in a modest home a few miles from downtown Santa Barbara, Calif. The website Margaretsweet.com, which promotes spirituality and New Age practices, recently carried a brief biography of McGovern, describing him as "a healer since 1988" who has worked "with energy in the area of the emotional fields."

"He uses philosophy, psychology and the intuitive to find resolutions that move people back into alignment with the universe and into a place of peace, harmony and joy," the site said. "Bob uses the intuitive to help people with a variety of life issues, including relationships, career and health."

The description, posted in a section of the website called "Helpful Dudes," stated that McGovern tries to empower individuals so that they can deal with the challenges of everyday life with greater understanding.

"His knowledge of the past and the future helps people find balance in the present," it said. "He is able to separate out surrounding negative energy, which allows people to have a clearer perception of their own options and choices."

-- Serge F. Kovaleski, who couldn't just say "cultist" or "quack," while writing for the New York Times

The John believes in NewAge (I didn't used to think that was true) but once he mentioned his ego as being part of the problem, rather than lust, I think he's bought into the whole thing. He definitely can't say he was thinking of the future. And we know Rielle Hunter got to him.

"Obviously, the effect of cancer extends beyond the patient to family members. Their lives become centered on the disease. I'm sure, even during periods of remission, it can cause people to act and think in ways that are not "in character."

Maybe that's what happened to John Edwards. Maybe he lost his way and was searching for something new and different, something affirming that would give him a greater awareness of himself and his connection to the universe. But did he have to run for President while seeking his new enlightenment?

I'm convinced there's still more here. And it's all going to come out, slowly, drip by agonizing drip."

-- Jeralyn, who doesn't know the half, at TalkLeft.com

John Edwards was Smiley Rielle's NewAge project:

"I'll lecture him on it when he's getting too much up in here," she said, gesturing toward her head. "He'll see a look on my face and say, 'Yes, I know, Rielle, "Power of Now" says …' " Rielle wanted me to know all these things because she wanted me to write about them. For the past five months, she said, she'd been traveling with Edwards with a video crew, capturing him in a variety of settings, public and private. She had cut her footage together into a series of short films, "Webisodes" that would run on the Internet. She hoped that with her unique eye for Edwards's true potential, she could show the world the real John Edwards and, in the process, help him to become the better version of himself. She wondered if I might be interested in writing a story. "Sure," I said, "if you let me see the films, we can talk about that."

-- Jonathan Darman, missing a great opportunity, in Newsweek

"It is interesting that Edwards trusted McGovern so much. Perhaps the media will continue to do a horrible job with this story. But as the money trail gets scrutinized and the ties to Santa Barbara and Hunter’s trusted network undergo more examination, will it treat the New Age aspects as something loopy and marginal or will they soberly examine whether or how New Age beliefs played a part in this story?"

-- Mollie, wondering the same thing I have, on GetReligion.org

Oh goodie. Story lines? Where to begin?

The Power Of Now and A New Earth - that's the schtick Oprah Winfrey started pushing after The Secret. (I wonder if some version of the line "You are the one that you've been waiting for" is mentioned in either one of those titles? I think the Dems might want to know,...."Cult of Obama" and all that.) Anyway, since Smiley Rielle has said she's really into The Power Of Now, her behavior could be seen, at least partially, as a result of Tolle's "powerful" message. And this wouldn't be a first of it's kind for Oprah. She keeps saying to "make your own truth," but that results in her fans lying to themselves and everybody else. And there's a lot of them.

"I had a story filled with an intense amount of emotional and mental suffering. Major dysfunction junction. And, for as long as I can remember I had a relentless desire for truth. This turned out to be a helpful combo. I was never comfortable, never felt enough love, never satisfied, never fulfilled and I would not stop until that ended. Point being: If I can wake up anyone can, what it takes is the desire and the commitment to do so."

-- Smiley Rielle, who could never "wake up," in a portion from her website that was posted on the appropriately named Deciever.com

"I had a relentless desire for truth,...what it takes is the desire and the commitment to do so."? So why won't she take a paternity test? She wants "privacy" after sleeping with a married U.S. Senator? Didn't Oprah say "truth matters" during the James Frey controversy? Shouldn't Rielle's baby have a right to the truth? Don't we all? Shouldn't John Edwards be demanding it? Shouldn't Elizabeth Edwards?

"The affair began long, long, long before she was hired to work for the campaign almost half a year before she was hired to work on those videos."

-- Pidgeon O'Brien, a one time close friend of Smiley Rielle's, to ABC News

It all leads me to some very troubling storylines.

Oprah is supposed to be some "moral arbiter" for the country. Is she really, if these repeated NewAge messes are the result her philosophy playing out? How does Barack Obama feel about Oprah's many philosophies? Does he endorse The Secret? If not, has he told Oprah? What was her response? Why does he think lines from his stump speech were also part of Rielle's NewAge jargon? Why are Edwards's untrustworthy people working for you? Does he read Self-Help books? In light of the fact Obama's been often charged with not saying anything of substance, what are the rest of us to make of his cult-like adoration? Does it bother him?

What should the average American think when the front-runner has a "cult"?And John Edwards falls for his subordinate's "ambitious new-age floozy,..."

Bill Clinton spouts off about turning Americans on to Ken Wilber's "higher state of consciousness," Hillary's "secret emotional life raft" was the psychic Jean Houston,...

Dennis Kucinich is prattling on about U.F.O.s, Nancy Pelosi's googly "trying to save the planet," with Tom Harken getting away with blowing billions of dollars touting bee pollen as a wonder cure and other quackery? Please? Anybody.

What's to be gathered from Andrew Sullivan's adding astrology to his journalistic mix? Or how the media has actively indulged such ideas with hardly any serious investigation into what's occurring? Come on, guys. All you've been doing is adding sugar to the Kool-Aid.

And it's got to be asked: what's going on with the men of the Democratic Party? Former President Bill Clinton, San Francisco's Mayor Gavin Newsom, Los Angeles's Mayor Antonio R. Villaraigosa, Elliott Spitzer, etc. Don't point at anybody else - what's going on with the men of the Democratic Party?

And even the women?!? No Democrat will ever tell another to "shape up!" (Something no one gives the Republicans credit for) Democrats just point their fingers at each other and say "He did it too!" or defiantly declare "I'm not going anywhere!" It's sad, stupid, and corrosive.

Why are all these NewAgers ripping down their websites? Because they know they're nuts. Why did Wikipedia start wiping pages over this? Because they're NewAgers and have got something to hide.

The media has been acting weird, regarding what they'll cover and how, for a long, long, time. They found something to sell. But we're not buying.

Oh - and by the way:

Elizabeth Edwards knew John was having an affair - and she let him run anyway. So it was all a lie. And they almost destroyed the party for it, just like Bill & Hill. The Dems just dodged another potentially fatal bullet there.

But it's still ricocheting - and it's already hit a kid. (Who's next?)